Pénétrable - Allégorie du geste et de la retenue, 2019
Steel, rubber, pigment
370 x 550 x 210 cm
Almine Rech, Paris, Brussels, London, New York, Shanghai
Petit Palais
Born in Ho Chi Minh City in 1979, Thu-Van Tran lives and works in Paris. Pénétrable - Allégorie de la forêt can be situated somewhere between a painting and a sculpture, an allegory of the elements that surround and compose us. A structure made from hevea wood and steel supports a double layer of rubber, separating - like a stage curtain - the realm of the fictional and the imaginary. The installation is also a theatre of history, rubber being a powerful symbol of colonial domination in past centuries, charging the seemingly abstract nature of the material with a more complex resonance. The work also demonstrates the poetic qualities of rubber; its tribal and sensual physicality evoking tensions, balance and tropical dampness.
Photo: Marc Domage